


Shiver

by audreycritter



Series: Cor Et Cerebrum [8]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Brothers, Gen, Legacies, alternate viewpoint of a chapter, bruce's birthday isn't spared from disaster, filler fic, platonic cuddling for warmth and comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-20
Updated: 2018-10-20
Packaged: 2019-08-04 19:50:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16353137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/audreycritter/pseuds/audreycritter
Summary: During Bruce's birthday party, there's a minor accident that makes Dick Grayson pause and take stock of himself, his relationship with Damian, and whether "okay" can be enough.





	Shiver

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CamsthiSky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CamsthiSky/gifts).



> This was written for a friend who requested Dick's perspective on the chapter of Developmental Milestones where Dick and Damian accidentally sled into a frozen lake. If you haven't read the chapter, it's here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8034538/chapters/18927814 BUT the important details are just that they end up in the frozen lake for a matter of seconds-- Superman is there and pulls them out.

The skin on his fingers is unbroken.

 

His hands sting as heat returns to them, a thousand little pincers crawling and biting inside each digit. Dick stares at one hand, half-buried in a plush blanket, his arms wrapped around Damian. Occasionally, Damian shivers.

 

His hands, he thinks, should bleed. They should be cracked and torn from scrabbling for a handhold on the icy bank. They should be raw from clinging to the snowy slope and tangling in the underbrush they skidded over before the second they were airborne. It had happened so fast, but fast is what Dick has trained for. His hands should be scarred with that effort.

 

On his lap, Damian shifts and snuggles closer to him. Beneath the cocoon of blankets they’re both wrapped in, the younger boy must feel secure enough to seek warmth. The room is edged with people, with conversation that drifts over them, but nobody will notice this little reach for comfort. 

 

Slowly, evenly, Dick draws a long breath in. 

 

It was just an accident, he reminds himself, when the fury rises through his ribs.

 

It could have been worse.

 

They’ve  _ dealt _ with worse.

 

This, he knows, is nothing in the grand scheme of things-- a minor accident, some wet clothes, an hour warming up. They had Superman at the house, for crying out loud. Damian’s stayed underwater longer on purpose, or just as cold, in Gotham’s bay. Unpleasant, yes; unfair on a birthday, yes; but-- Dick’s arms tighten around Damian’s-- they’re okay.

 

They’re okay, he tells himself over and over. 

 

They’re okay.

 

He didn’t just nearly cost Bruce another son on a day off, of all things,  _ sledding _ of all things. If he’d had a hard time convincing Damian to indulge in traditional, fun activities before it was going to be twice as hard now.

 

“Richard?” Damian sounds sleepy when he tilts his head back. “You are shivering.”

 

“Just cold, Dames,” Dick whispers back. “I’m fine.”

 

He’s not fine. He’s shaking. It’s not even the cold. He tears his gaze away from his hands, forces himself to look at Damian,  _ forces _ a smile, and then finds refuge in the blind stare of the flickering fire. The fire isn’t going to raise one eyebrow in doubt, scowl at him, and scold him with a soft  _ tt _ .

 

Damian does that anyway, even without Dick’s direct attention.

 

“Fine,” Damian says. “I believed we were past deceiving one another, but I was mistaken.”

 

Damn little brothers for being perceptive  _ and _ blunt.

 

Dick sighs and lets his chin fall on Damian’s head, pillowed in soft, black hair that curls at the ends as it dries.Damian tries so hard to straighten it out, to leave it spiked and sharp like his head is covered with blades-- always on the defense, always ready to strike first. Now, washed with frigid lake water, it’s slightly sticky where some hair gel remains but mostly just impossibly soft, still baby-fine for all its thickness, curling at the very tips where it’s longest.

 

It’s a lot like Damian, Dick thinks. A manufactured shell over something still so  _ young _ and gentle. 

 

Irritated, in earnest or for show, Damian tuts at him again and wriggles his head. Dick presses his chin down more firmly and Damian gives up with what sounds suspiciously like a content little sigh.

 

“Fine,” Dick says. “I’m not fine. I’m angry.”

 

“I am not positive you understand the meaning of the word,” Damian says, skeptically, and it’s a delayed second before Dick understands the fear beneath it.

 

_ At me? _

 

“I’m angry at myself for not checking that hill more carefully. We could have been sledding down the opposite side.”

 

“You’re a fool, Richard,” Damian says simply. 

 

“Hm,” Dick says, not arguing. He jostles Damian in his arms. “You warming up?” 

 

“I believe my core body temperature is nearly at a satisfactory level. I require several more minutes at a minimum.”

 

Dick thinks that’s code for ‘I’m comfortable and don’t want to move but I don’t want to say that,’ but he lets it slide instead of teasing. He’s finding too much comfort in it himself, maybe selfishly, to want to risk Damian leaping up and deciding he’s done because Dick’s teasing made him self-conscious. 

 

“So, I’m a fool,” Dick says.

 

“Sledding was an acceptable form of entertainment. Falling into the lake was not your fault any more than it was mine,” Damian says stubbornly. “If anything, I should have checked the hill. We both know you are often impulsive and act without thinking.”

 

“Wow, Little D, I think the fire’s roasting me enough,” Dick says, nudging him in the side. But, he feels better. “It wasn’t your fault, either.”

 

“I know that,” Damian says sharply, as if annoyed. “I do not make such mistakes. Therefore, it was an accident.”

 

Somewhere in there is a lesson Dick should point out about humility or something, but he’s just not up to it, and so he just laughs, low and soft. Damian bristles and Dick begins rubbing a hand in circles between Damian’s shoulder blades, under the blanket.

 

“Okay, okay,” Dick says, some of the tightness in his chest easing up. “Point taken, partner.”

 

Now, the self-recrimination is replaced by another kind of ache. His palm ghosts over Damian’s bare back and brushes over scars with every circle. There are so many,  _ too _ many, for such a young boy. His shoulder blades are still angular, jutting through skin even while packed all over with muscle. There’s a long, straight surgical scar and a myriad of others Dick couldn’t place just from this light touch. Damian’s breath rises and falls under Dick’s hand, and Dick is struck with the desire to protect him from every danger, every threat, from this moment forward.

 

It isn’t the first time he’s felt that way.

 

It isn’t the first time he’s failed.

 

And he knows Damian is right-- some things just aren’t in his control, no matter how much he wants them to be. 

 

His eyes cast around the room, roaming, searching; he finds Bruce in a corner because of  _ course _ he is, a wallflower at his own party, family events being the only social engagements he can afford to not put on an act at. He’s got a book in his hands, but he’s watching Jason and Cass while Dick watches him. Then, his gaze moves to Tim; to Steph; then he meets Dick’s eyes directly and there’s a question there.

 

Dick gives a short nod.

 

_ We’re okay _ .

 

Bruce looks back down at the book. Dick guesses he won’t get very far before sweeping the room again, and he knows now this is what Bruce felt all those times Dick got hurt and overreacted. The strict boundaries, the shorter patrols, the long breaks-- he’d always been so tempted to think it was that Bruce lost a little bit of trust in him each time, no matter what they said when they argued.

 

Now, he knows, knows in his bones, it was more like this, this sitting and wanting to keep Damian in his arms the rest of the night just in  _ case _ , just because it  _ could have been worse _ . He knows because he did this for a whole year when it was just him and Damian and Alfred most of the time, and if Damian jumped up right now and said he wanted to go sled some more, Dick would have a hell of a time not just telling him they were done for the day.

 

He thinks,  _ hopes _ , he’d be a bit better at explanations than Bruce was then, but he also knows fear is a funny thing. Fear, for all Damian’s bravado, is why he’ll snuggle now under blankets with the excuse of helping Dick warm up, too, but is reluctant to ask when he’s just having a bad day. Maybe someday Damian won’t be so afraid of asking, of needing.

 

Dick knows, too, that if that day comes, he’ll be just as afraid of being helpless while Damian gets hurt. Some fears, he thinks, probably never fade.

 

His hand is still moving between Damian’s shoulder blades and he looks down to check on him, and finds Damian’s mouth hanging open just slightly and his eyes closed. He sneaks a forehead kiss while he can, while Damian is just awake enough to grumble, “Ri’hard,  _ disgushing, _ ” which is probably ‘disgusting’ but Dick can pretend it’s some other word he doesn’t know yet.

 

“What’s that? You love me?” Dick says, into Damian’s now-toasty ear. “I couldn’t quite make it out. I love you, too.”

 

“ _ Mmmffftt, _ ” Damian says, eloquently and kindly in reply. His next breath is a snore and Dick knows he’s  _ out _ out. Like, won’t move for a while kind of out. He settles back on the couch, relaxing, staring into the fire again while he thinks and lets his mind drift sort of aimlessly. 

 

His arms are full of brother, warm and safe and well. Bruce promised this didn’t ruin his birthday, and well, sometimes Dick has to look at Bruce and hear what he’s saying and answer,  _ bullshit don’t be a fucking idiot _ , and then other times it’s just worth trusting him and taking him at his word. He cradles Damian to his chest and wonders what it would have been like to have a little brother when he was  _ little _ , what life would have looked like if he’d been nine years old and came home from school to cuddle a toddler brother before going down to put the Robin mask on and go out with Bruce.

 

Somehow, in every  _ what if _ , he’s always still Robin, Bruce is always still Batman. There isn’t an ideal past where that part of the world changes-- even when he was younger and indulged in the brief fantasy of his parents being alive, in whatever way that happened. They never fell, or they showed up one day and it was a mistake, or magic, or time travel, or  _ whatever _ ….somehow, he’s always still Robin to Bruce’s Batman. That part of him and his life just goes on, regardless of everything around it, even in the daydreams where Mary kisses him and tells him to be safe on his way out of the cave.

 

It’s silly, he knows, to meld the different halves of his life like that. They’re polarized magnets that never fit together in reality, the  _ before _ and the  _ after _ , but his dreams don’t respect rules. So, he dreams this, too, a life where Damian doesn’t have a scar running the length of his spine and the remnants of blades and knives and arrows and snakes and bullets all over his too-young body, where Dick holds him and they watch the robins out the window of the Manor in the spring.

 

His throat is weirdly tight, and someone is talking to him.

 

“Dick,” Dev says, and Dick startles a little.

 

He fumbles through a moment of conversation with him, checks Damian’s breathing, says he wants to let Damian keep sleeping which is true but he also means  _ don’t ruin this for me, don’t shatter this moment _ .

 

The reality is that he can’t undo the way things were, from Damian’s childhood to the two of them being flung over a frozen lake, but somehow, they’re  _ okay _ . 

 

He has him, the Robin to  _ his _ Batman, in his arms, and they’re alive, and breathing, and maybe Dick lied earlier when he said he was fine, but now it’s not a lie.

 

He’s fine.

 

Damian will sleep some more, rouse and be grumpy and sour, and Dick will love him exactly the way he is. They’ll eat birthday cake and watch a movie and Damian will creep across the room to cuddle against to him again and pretend he isn’t doing it for himself, but he’ll do it.

 

The sense of relief as it finally settles in is so visceral, almost like honey on his tongue, that Dick shivers again, and this time it isn’t the cold.

 


End file.
